[Update for ASP.NET MVC RC available] 

The code in the attached ZIP file implements a custom View Engine for ASP.NET MVC Beta using VB.NET XML literals.  Instead of traditional ASP.NET pages, the views are implemented as VB.NET classes.

The package contains a Visual Studio solution with two projects (the standard  ASP.NET MVC starter template rewritten to use VB.NET XML views, and the library implementing the view engine), the license document, and README document.

Notes:

View engine registration is done in GLOBAL.ASAX in Application_Start method:

    ViewEngines.Engines.Add(New VbViewEngine)

VbViewEngine, instead of searching directories for files, looks for a class derived from VbView named ActionName in namespace *.Views.ControllerName in the assembly of the controller.

ASPX, MASTER and ASCX files implementing MVC views are replaced with VB classes derived from  VbView.  Many ASP.NET concepts have direct analogs in VB.NET (or OO world in general). For example, a master page get replaced with a base class. Here is how Index view looks in VB.NET:

    Namespace Views.Home
        Public Class Index
            Inherits SiteMaster

            Public Overrides Function RenderContent() As XElement
                Return <div>
                         <h2><%= Xhtml.Encode(ViewData("Message")) %></h2>
                         <p>To learn more about ASP.NET MVC ...</p>
                       </div>
            End Function
        End Class
    End Namespace

The entire application is compiled into one assembly.  There are no ASPX files that need to be deployed.

Unfortunately HTML helpers that come with ASP.NET MVC are not usable from VB.NET XML views because HTML helpers return strings.  XHTML helper class has been added that has [some of] the methods found on HTML helper -- they return XElements  instead of strings.  Here is the implementation of validation summary helper using VB.NET XML literals:

    Public Function ValidationSummary() As XElement
        If _viewData.ModelState.IsValid Then
            Return Nothing
        End If

        Return <ul class="validation-summary-errors">
                   <%= From e In _viewData.ModelState From m In e.Value.Errors Select _
                       <li><%= m.ErrorMessage %></li> _
                   %>
               </ul>
    End Function

The controller code in the starter template did not change at all, even though all the views have been replaced to use a different view engine.  This is a good thing -- it validates the separation of concerns in MVC.

Your feedback and suggestions are most welcome!

Thanks,

Dmitry